To our older generation,

Born in the late 90s, I fall automatically into being the stereotypical millennial. While it is the term for my age group, there are often many aspects people give a millennial that are not true. Today, I hear a lot of “millennials do this” and “millennials do that”, from people who I think do not truly understand the entirety of the millennial gap.

First off, a lot of people do not even know the true range in years that are considered being millennial. While it is broken into several sections by different professionals, the noted age range for the millennial generation is as early as 1982. Millennials are noted to be born within 1982 to 2002. However, today many people associate them with being born within the 90s and early 2000s. Some even say millennials are born as early as 1976, my dad was 4 years old then (sorry dad). With all that scattered information I think we can say that we don’t really have a defined category for millennials. So when we refer to millennials being guilty of certain actions, who are we talking about?

Commonly, the people born in the 90s and early 2000s are who people reference as the millennials who cause all these problems we are having. Either we don’t have respect, or we are lazy, or we don’t know enough for our own good. You name it, we’ve been blamed for it. I think it is time to stop blaming, and underestimating this group of individuals we are defining as millennials.

The truth of the matter is WE ARE NOT ALL ALIKE. We don’t all sit around and wait for things to be handed to us like some people think. We aren’t all stuck in a video game/ cell phone crazed daze all the time. Not all of us are lazy, narcissistic, and ungrateful like we have been claimed to be. Don’t get me wrong there are people my age that do all of these things, but it is time we start recognizing the brilliance behind our millennials. Besides if all the older generations do is complain and hate on our generation how do they expect us to thrive. If you say we are all failures, then you’re setting us all up to fail. So stop, look at what the other parts of this group of young people have accomplished.

Take it from me, I got into business school when I was only 18 during my first semester of college. I was beating out 24 year old’s who still couldn’t get into the program. There are students my age who are writing books, creating software, and doing such incredible things that would take some 30 year old’s years to do. Every single one of my friends have goals and aspirations. My own 13 year old brother somewhat knows what he wants to do with his life. Trust me some of us don't like the laziness either. Actually 50% of the stereotypes people give our generation, we already don't like about it ourselves.

So now comes the time where we stop complaining about a group of young people just because they are growing up in the digital age. You have a group of brillant minds in front of you waiting to be molded. We have to remember that it is our elders who created what we are exposed to. So, if you don’t classify yourself as a millennial, please don’t bash the generation. Just know that there IS hope for our generation, but you have to start acting like it if you want to see it.

Best,

A Milliennial